Rotten Apple
Trusted Member
By Eric Litke
Sheboygan Press staff
A 25-year-old Sheboygan man was charged Wednesday for allegedly striking and throwing a 21-month-old girl when she wouldn't stop crying, leaving her critically injured.
The toddler, who was hospitalized Saturday, remained in critical condition Wednesday afternoon at Children's Hospital in Milwaukee, according to the Sheboygan Police Department.
Jerry A. Hilbelink, the boyfriend of the girl's mother, is being held on a $100,000 cash bond on two counts of felony physical abuse of a child that could land him in prison for up to 14 years if convicted, prosecutors said.
A criminal complaint alleges Hilbelink slapped the girl in the back of the head Saturday afternoon and then dropped her two feet into a crib, causing her to strike her head on the railing. But another man who lived at the home told police the abuse was ongoing, reporting that Hilbelink had pushed, slapped and thrown the girl — and urged her 4-year-old brother to do the same — over the last two weeks, the complaint said.
http://www.sheboygan-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080228/SHE0101/802280535/1973/frontpage
The mother of this child obviously has some poor judgment. One of the witnesses to the abuse was a registered sex offender living in the home who had just been arrested for cutting off his monitoring bracelet.